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PLEASE EDUCATE OUR CHILDREN.

I think I spend most of my day considering how I can improve the life of my kids. How can I help them succeed? How can I help them overcome the low expectations that society has of them. As soon as I think I really do not have anything to worry about someone opens their mouth and I despair. Success starts with education and educational success is about expectations. Education is life long and not about getting a job, it is about being equipped to contribute to society. Expectation start at home.

Children need to see their parents making an effort. They need to understand that life is challenging and that they have to push to succeed. They need to experience failure early so they understand that life is not all strawberries and cream. Only by allowing them to fail can they truly understand the joy of success. This joy is what develops confidence. The type of confidence that laughs at a society that does not expect much from them. They need to develop that confidence early. If you are an American of African heritage that development of confidence needs to happen really early because no matter how well you perform the expectation is that you are not good enough. Confidence in spite of low expectations will allow them to take hold of the new experiences on offer at school.

The evidence is clear that good quality preschool is an important part of preparing kids for success. What is good quality preschool and does poor quality preschool damage your kids? The latter question is what concerns me the most these days. I know I am preparing my kids for success. I am confident that they are well prepared. But in spite of what I do at home the need to learn the social rules cannot be taught from a book. They need to learn to tolerate stupidity without resorting to violence. They

The Princesses

need to learn to work with strangers. They need to learn to identify the predators. Socialization at school is where that all starts.

The unfortunate thing is that the quality of preschool in general is low and I am concerned about the low expectations that the system has of them. Allowing low expectations of minority kids is driving the nail into the coffin of our country. The majority of the popular soon will be from those minority groups for which expectations are low. If they have not gotten a good education, who will be taking care of the country in our old age?
I am mad, not because I care about the in ability to see that my kids intellect is not defined by her skin color, but that we do not see the harm being doing to this great nation.
Our kids are bored and misbehave. They need to be challenged. It is hard work but it can be done. My experience so far does not give me any hope for improvement in the quality of education and specifically preschool. I still think we can turn it around. Expectation is success. My parents expected their kids to succeed and we did. My teachers expected us to succeed and provided us a challenging educational environment. Thanks. I will do the same for my princesses because they deserve to succeed. They will succeed because I expect it of them.
What are your expectations?